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Talk:James Farley
The OTL section, second paragraph states: "Farley defeated a Roosevelt bid to secure the NYS nominee for governor in 1942." What does NYS stand for? ML4E (talk) 18:41, April 17, 2015 (UTC) :New York State. The dangers of copy pasting from another web site. I went ahead and re-wrote to make it clearer. TR (talk) 19:37, April 17, 2015 (UTC) I thought it might be something like that. Thanks. ML4E (talk) 15:34, April 18, 2015 (UTC) Farley Files When I reread the first chapter last night (I had to return the book to the library after an initial 3 week loan and picked it up again over the weekend), the paragraph on Sullivan thinking about Farley keeping notes on people he and Roosevelt had met rang a bell. From the same Wikipedia article I cribbed from: :"The concept figures prominently in Robert A. Heinlein's novel Double Star, in which an actor impersonates a major political figure. He is able to extend the impersonation into personal encounters by use of the politician's Farley file." Think this might be a "Literary Allusion" or is it too tenuous? Heinlein's novel refers to the concept specifically as "Farleyfiles" and has the information typed on individual index cards. ML4E (talk) 19:12, June 1, 2015 (UTC) :Since farley files are common, I'd say too tenuous for a literary allusion. TR (talk) 19:42, June 1, 2015 (UTC) :Fair enough. I am curious if you had experience with these in real life? I haven't. I just vaguely recalled the Heinlein reference and verified it along with an expansion of the article to cover them. ML4E (talk) 16:58, June 2, 2015 (UTC) ::Not that I am aware of, but most of my direct contacts with politicians have taken place in small communities. A good memory for names and faces will probably suffice in those circumstances. TR (talk) 17:08, June 2, 2015 (UTC) ::Probably so. ML4E (talk) 17:16, June 3, 2015 (UTC) :I just read Double Star a few months ago. That's the only place I've ever heard of Farley files either by name or by concept. Like TR, most of my direct contact with politicians has been on the local level so it's not hard to imagine that they'd be able to remember me without such files (especially since my dad used to dabble in those circles and is still known to most of them). I've also met a handful of members of Congress over the years, including John McCain. Unfortunately, I don't think I've ever met any of them twice (certainly not McCain, who's the only one in the bunch whose name anyone but a hard-core political junky would be likely to recognize) so I couldn't verify whether this process is alive and well or not. ::Certainly based on the way Heinlein described it, if Farley files are still in use then one of the Congressmen (or women) or their aides might have created a file on you to record the personal interaction for potential future use. :::I don't believe I wound up telling any of them anything about myself that was interesting enough to merit filing away. Turtle Fan (talk) 00:23, June 4, 2015 (UTC) ::My personal interactions with politicians would be letters (or e-mails these days) which are self-recording rather than face to face aside from the occasional door to door canvasing during elections. ML4E (talk) 17:16, June 3, 2015 (UTC) :::Same, though I've never gone canvassing. I've called my representatives' offices sometimes, and I get aides asking for my name and what part of the constituency I'm from before they say "I'll make sure to pass your concerns along to the senator." I know that last bit is blowing smoke up my ass, but I suppose the rest might find its way into a file somewhere. Certainly the majority of people never bother calling their members' offices, and it's probably worth making some sort of note about those who do. Turtle Fan (talk) 00:23, June 4, 2015 (UTC) :By the way, now that it's jogging my memory, I could have sworn that Heinlein credited the Farley File to one of Eisenhower's aides, not one of Roosevelt's. I could be misremembering, but as a history buff I have to think I'd be unlikely to mix the two up. Turtle Fan (talk) 18:17, June 2, 2015 (UTC) ::When my memory was twigged, I dug out my copy of Double Star and verified it. In the section I read, the character rather than Heinlein as narrator said Eisenhower which would have gone over my head at the time but I now attribute to a bit of characterization on Heinlein's part since Lorenzo (The Great!) is an apolitical neophyte at the time. ML4E (talk) 17:16, June 3, 2015 (UTC) :::I thought so. It could be that Heinlein was deliberately making Lorenzo get something wrong, or it could have been some sort of poetic license on the part of Heinlein himself. Turtle Fan (talk) 00:23, June 4, 2015 (UTC)